Thursday, July 31, 2014

Sixth Inning: 9-9

Starting pitcher
M.C. O'Connor

The Giants are 58-50, exactly three back of LA in the West. The Dodgers have played 108 games as well. San Francisco is tied with Atlanta for top spot in the Wild Card chase, leading Pittsburgh and St. Louis by a hair (1/2 game) and a scosche (one game). The Cardinals just acquired John Lackey from the Red Sox. The defending World Series Champs have traded away three of their starters! Here's the season so far:

This last inning had a nice stretch where the team won 8 of 11, but they followed that with 0-for-6 before salvaging a win yesterday. This inning sort of summed up the whole bi-polar season. The Giants play well or they play poorly, they don't seem to have a middle ground. They stomped the Dodgers early in the season, winning 7 of the first 10 games between the two clubs, then got their asses kicked last weekend. The Giants scored 123 runs in May and scored 85 runs in July. Like I said, bi-polar. The injuries are to blame, of course, gutting the team of any semblance of depth and forcing quite a bit of roster-bation. And the guys who have been healthy (other than Hunter Pence) have not delivered what we expected. They've got two months to turn it around--exactly 54 games, three seasonal innings. At this point it is anybody's guess what they will do. I could see them collapsing completely and taking themselves out of the race. I could see them getting their shit together and making a legit run. I could see them muddling along, staying close, driving us all crazy with "will they/won't they?" questions before having it all decided in the last two weeks. Weird team, man. Weird season.

Giants are in New York for four with the Mets starting Friday at 4:10 Pacific. Vogelsong, Peavy, Bumgarner, and Hudson are scheduled.

Its way too early to give up on the division. So we quickly lost 12 games in the standings to the bums, time to get about 5 or 6 of those games back. Giants have found very creative ways to lose. Almost everyone contributes to the losses, ie; a new person every day. The pen was flawless in the pirate series, unfortunately the starters sucked. Last month for a stretch the starters were good and the pen sucked. Not too long ago the giants had made less errors than the bums. No longer the case. We had given up the least walks, no longer the case. After tonight we will be 10th in N.L. runs scored. Time to get Belt and Pagan back, hopefully on all cylinders. Scutaro would be nice too. Suck the chips out of Cain's elbow and maybe we can have him back for October.

We are not in the wild card race! We are only 3 games behind LA. And LA didn't catch up to us, we fell to them, they have been human this year, and with Kemp agitating, that will keep the chemistry toxic enough in that clubhouse that they don't play to their potential.

What is wrong is pretty simple. It was not lack of depth: who has depth enough to replace their leadoff hitter and #2-3 hitter? Nobody, it was not having a better option at 2B or backup CF, that's minor stuff compared to losing Pagan and Belt, we won all those games in the early season with no 2B, and we were still winning until we lost Belt.

The starting pitching has actually been pretty good for most of the season, they were only truly bad in the early weeks, but the offense at that time saved the day and we had a great record. Then they got things together, the offense returned to regular, and so we continued to win. Losing Pagan didn't really slow us down much, it was losing Belt on top of Pagan that began the downward spiral.

The bullpen had been pretty good except for, really, that weekend,and really, that was Romo suddenly losing it. Otherwise, the bullpen has been pretty good.

We've seen what a good weekend of baseball can do. Three games is nothing, I agree. The Giants are certainly in the West race. But they are in the Wild Card race, too. I don't think it is giving up to say that. There are two paths to the post-season, one better than the other, but two nonetheless. Either way, the Giants have to start plying better ball and winning some goddamn games.

OK, I see what you are saying from your perspective. Of course, that is technically true, because anytime you are competitive for the division title, you are usually competitive for the wild card spots as well.

What I was responding to is the prevalent view I've seen, where competing for the wild card means that you are out of the division title race, so you can forget about that. Talk about the wild card race is equivalent right now, at least to me, of giving up on the division title since obviously, if you are battling for the division title, most times you are also battling for the wild card. On rare occasions that is not true, but generally, with so much of the season left, most teams can make up a lot of ground still (per the Dusty Baker rule of gaining a game in the standings every week).

The Giants stayed pat and made no splashy moves other than Peavy. Good news re Cain--no ligament damage. Bad news, I'm guessing he'll get shut down. And have surgery this fall. But, we'll see. Maybe he's got some starts left in his arm.

The Giants need to get healthy. They need Pagan and Belt in the lineup. I'm excited by the rooks--Panik and Susac. Let's hope they can contribute. Looks like more rookie help is on the way--Jarrett Parker OF and Matt Duffy IF are coming up from AA Richmond!

Not your usual "get-a-vet" Sabean response, is it? Duffy was born Jan 15, 1991 making him the youngest on the roster.